


A Fine Winter

by UnshoddenShipper



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bilbo Remains In Erebor, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Dwarf Culture & Customs, F/M, Female Bilbo Baggins, Hobbit Culture & Customs, One-sided Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield, Pipeweed, Rebuilding Erebor, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-24
Updated: 2019-05-11
Packaged: 2019-11-05 01:39:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 12,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17909564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnshoddenShipper/pseuds/UnshoddenShipper
Summary: Ms. Baggins and Ori are close, but they have unfinished business.(Re-wrote and re-named my old fic, now coming with more and better smut.)





	1. One

Bilbo purled and knitted row after row, making soft clicks with metal needles; another of her life’s differences here. Her purple yarn lazily unspooled into a vest’s maw, which gradually sipped it up.

The hobbit pulled her toes back from a popping fireplace, tucking them beside herself on an armchair. If you’d asked Ms. Baggins, whose room this was, these chairs were simply too big— big enough for two hobbits. And true, she’d add, most wouldn’t mind. But this was Erebor, and it was unlikely she would be sharing space with a hobbit ever again.

Instead, Ori sat in the chair beside her, writing quietly.

Pursing his lips, the quill’s rasping ceased, and he leaned back to read over his page.

“What do you think of this?" Ori asked quietly, handing her the parchment. Blowing the ink as she took it, Bilbo shifted in her armchair to face him.

"These are sentence fragments here," she pointed, "And I would rephrase the second paragraph; it sounds a bit disjointed." She handed it back to him. "But it's lovely."

"Thank you," Ori smiled the same way he usually did; clear eyes, closed lips. Simple.

“You know, a hundred years from now," Bilbo picked up her knitting again. "In a hundred years, they'll look on your logs and journals, and read about the Company and the rebuilding of Erebor, and they'll say, 'That Ori. Aren’t we lucky to have had him around?’”

He shook his head with a lopsided smile. "No... In a hundred years, I won't stand to read it. Because, all I'll think about is how that was the best time of my life. And how silly I was."

Bilbo blinked for a moment, setting aside her knitting a second time in the cheery little room. She‘d forgotten he'd be alive then. Then another thing hit her.

"Now just a minute!" she cried. "Who said you're silly! Whatever for?"

Ori’s eyes widened at first, but then he shrugged dismissively. “Just having a laugh."

"Don't think for one moment you're not terribly important, Ori," Bilbo furrowed her brow seriously. "I've met kings and wizards and you're one of the most remarkable people in Middle Earth."

His face reddened, and hesitating just a second, he reached over to give her smaller hand a squeeze. Bilbo smiled, and turned it so they were palm-to-palm, and held him fast. They sat in silence, smelling how snapping flames licked the last of their seasoned applewood. One window was open, letting in fresh air and out the Dragon’s ammonia stench that still clung around.

Bilbo’s gaze drifted to Ori, looking so peaceful with his eyes closed, and she took her time admiring him. Honest, he was a freak of nature by Shire standards, but after all their adventures she found him cute. His face was good-natured under all that hair; his freckles and nose familiar. Their fire cast a warm glow on the dwarf, and Bilbo felt her heartstrings tug affectionately.

"Can I get you some tea?" Ori startled her with his voice.

"Tea would be lovely," she gave an oddly quiet answer, suddenly and all at once nervous and comforted.

Bilbo watched Ori get up with a final squeeze to her hand. He pulled the kettle from the fire with his bare hands, and Bilbo couldn’t help but be delighted— just like any time the dwarves wove their casual magic. Ms. Baggins moved over in her seat, patting beside herself. Ori drew up short in surprise, brows shooting up for the briefest of moments, before he smiled broadly and it crinkled his face. As Ori came back with two teas and nestled in beside her, he was toasty and soft, and smelled of pipeweed and tobacco.

He passed Bilbo her dwarven cup. Closing her eyes, Bilbo allowed her tea to steep and her body to relax here, wedged against Ori's pliant cardigan. On impulse— she had many of these lately— Bilbo pressed close to him, and kissed his whiskery cheek. Ori paused, mug at his lips, and looked down at her with relief breaking the clouds in his face.

"I wasn’t sure.” Ori was very pink now, and beaming like they’d gotten up to mischief. “...But I’m glad, Bilbo,” he murmured. She gave a quiet, understanding little smirk over the coiling steam of her tea.

They sipped their cups in companionable silence, and Bilbo leaned her weight against him, as she had countless times before. This time, Ori turned his head, and kissed the hobbit on her curls. Bilbo looked up and him, and he flushed.

"Was that right?" His voice was hushed, intimate yet stricken. Bilbo pressed her brow to his forehead in answer, and Ori was very quiet.

As he drifted closer to Bilbo’s face, they locked eyes. “Surely you aren’t scared of me?” she murmured, with that crooked smile he loved so much. Ori smiled with teeth, and they leaned forward together, carefully touching foreheads. Ori sucked a breath. Never stopping, Bilbo turned and faced him fully, and he did the same; Bilbo cupping his face, keeping it close. Ori breathed in, out, and in— and looped his arms about her waist and shoulders, hugging her securely to himself. A broad grin grew on Bilbo’s face, and she opened her eyes, nose to his nose.

“I think you’re beautiful," he whispered, thickly.

When their mouths met it was a simple thing; they held each other so close already. Still terribly alien to Ori though, whom with eyes open half the time, puckered his lips too far and too squishy. For the hell of it Bilbo did the same, and found out she may just prefer this way after all. The eye contact gave her shivers, in a decidedly good way. The dwarf-kisses were always firmer than she expected, but Ori far from hurt her.

Bilbo wrapped her arms around him, enjoying loose, squishy layers. Alternating between their different kisses, floaty with pipeweed, the pair mouthed and pressed and nuzzled their way into a heady fog. Ori's beard was rather soft, too— too long to prickle, and he grazed her ears and neck with tiny kisses making Bilbo laugh.

They slowed down as the fire burned low, and the air got chilled from that damn window. Bilbo swung her leg over his waist, straddling him, and Ori accidentally groaned. Thighs warm, hands warm, mouth warm... Blouse thin enough. She licked his bottom lip and he did the same inquisitively, raising an eyebrow as their mouths opened and tongues touched. It was slimy, and tasted of copper. But her tongue felt better the longer they did it, until Ori was groaning again, and his eyes rolled back into his head as they fumblingly delved deeper. Bilbo fisted his sweater’s chest and held him fast, clever little fingers clawing that yarn like his fluttering heart.

Ori’s hands were on her hips now, as she rocked them together and his jaw fell open. Bilbo’s breathy moans squeezed the air from him, and she angled her hips to rub through their clothes using his stiff prick. She squeezed her eyes shut and her lips dropped apart like that, all pink and swollen. They chased each other with their mouths when they parted for too long, Bilbo bouncing, Ori sloppily thrusting upwards.

"Wait! Wait,” he gasped, and Bilbo stopped, concern on her face.

"Are you alright?"

“Yes! Oh, Durin’s Beard." They rested their foreheads together and breathed, chests heaving for a moment. Opening his eyes, Ori swallowed. "What are we doing, Bilbo," his voice was young, his face bright red.

"I‘m not so sure anymore.” Bilbo moved so their lips could ever so dryly brush. "We can stop," she whispered.

His breath was warm, and he asked just as softly, “Do you want to?”

The hobbit shook her head, snaking her hands up and into his hair. She rubbed his bearded cheek with hers before tenderly, lingeringly, kissing his mouth. Bilbo pressed her cheek to his chest, feeling Ori’s pulse hammer through the knitting. The dwarf wrapped his arms around her and pulled her flush, and Bilbo arched into it, rubbing her breasts firmly to him and grinding their hips together. Ori gasped and ground back, and made a satisfied little noise clutching her thighs.

“I want this,” he croaked, “but… no more tonight.” Ori kissed their brows together, struggling to explain with a red face. “I’ll, ah— a, a mess—“

Bilbo kissed the corner of his mouth. “Say no more.”

The next morning, the pair lay intertwined on the chair, Bilbo sandwiched between Ori and the backrest. They shared his cardigan, Ori cocooning her whilst their legs dangled off the arm. The first thing Ori knew was the heat of Bilbo’s body. Then everything else was stiff and cold, pulling him from sleep. Ori blinked blearily, and found himself in a faceful of curls.

He smiled a crooked little smile, and closed his eyes again. "Bilbo," he hummed, throat froggy. She didn’t stir.

"Bilbo, it’s morning." Nothing. Ori yawned, and stretched a booted leg ‘til it spasmed. "Mmmm. We have to get up," the dwarf reasoned in a mild voice.

"Aren’t we already, though?” she countered, rolling over inside his sweater. Bilbo gave an inviting, good-morning smirk and Ori gave back embarrassed little laugh, even as he climbed atop her. He smiled sleepily again as Bilbo shimmied to be fully under him. The hobbit settled in and spread her legs contentedly, disheveled and quite gay about this turn in her never-ending adventure. Supporting his weight on his elbows, Ori leaned down, and gave her a long dwarf-kiss. Bilbo gave it right back, grasping his shoulders with passion.

“When I wasn’t too terrified, I haven’t stopped thinking of you kissing me in Lake Town,” Ori whispered, a breathy and honest thing, in her ear. Bilbo grimaced.

“Ori, please,” she cooed sadly, the pain in her heart still too fresh after everything. Ori murmured and mouthed at her in apology, again and again. And Bilbo let herself melt, like runny honey, into him.

The two dragged their hips lazily, the length of his prick rubbing firmly and eagerly against her. Spreading her warm thighs further, the hobbit smiled into Ori’s collarbone, arms wrapping around the dwarf. He grunted softly, curling thick fingers on the bone of her hip— Bilbo almost laughed, realizing in that second Ori was hesitant to grab her ass.

Their thrusts found a rhythm.

The push of his weight, the drag of wet cotton, the heat of Ori’s cock had Bilbo arching and sighing. She ran her nails down his back, then up again and under his tunic. Fingers splaying over warm, moving skin, she felt his back flexing under her hands as he thrust an old-fashioned Lithedays dance. Leaning her head back she groaned, and he seized her neck with his mouth, making love to it as Bilbo smiled with her head nearly upside-down.

Muffled, masculine voices drifted down from outside Bilbo’s home. Ori’s lips made a soft ‘smeck!’ pulling off Bilbo’s neck and the pair stared at the still door.

Ori cussed.

"Ah!" Oin smiled as the pair approached him, hooking thumbs in his pockets. "Breakfast is ready, whelps. Be quick! Or it’ll be gone it will."

Rolls flew overhead as loud guffawing and arguments filled the dining room. Bofur nudged Balin, and they agreed about something, while Kili and Dwalin bickered, and Bombur and his wife held hands on the table, listening as Gloin regaled those closest with an animated tale. Nori and Thorin read something quite seriously together. Ducking a flying toy, Bilbo caught Ori’s eye, and they shared a smile.

Breakfast was a pleasant affair, with dishes passed and jam fought over. Despite settling into Erebor, nobody thought about it when they kept taking meals as a Company. Even when Glóin and Bombur’s wives arrived with their children, they had simply drawn up more chairs.

The dwarflings liked Bilbo well enough. Her novelty to them was starting to wear off, if not entirely. This morning she sat beside Glóin’s boy, Gimli; just entering his tween years by her reckoning.

"Aunt Bilbo, can you pass the meat?"

"Of course."

"Thank you.” Gimli slathered butter on his mutton-steak with care. "So what do you do again?" The lad took a bite, watching her with interest.

“I’m a linguist; I translate things,” Bilbo explained, catching a roll as it flew overhead.

"That’s not what Nori said.”

“Never mind what Nori said.”

“Never mind who now?” Nori perked from down the table.

Ori ate his breakfast and kept his peace, only smirking to himself every so often.

“And what’s on your mind?” Dori asked privately beside him, sounding pleased. Ori took a big bite of bacon as he looked over innocently, chewing to buy himself some time.

“..It’s going to be a fine winter, I think,” is what he settled on.


	2. Two

Decades of decay, filth, and vermin had infected Erebor’s endless halls. And every day since Dáin’s arrival, rubble and skeletons had been exhumed at a snail’s pace from the veins of the Mountain. Yet hundreds of strewn corpses in blackened armor still had to be found, and laid to rest in a stone womb deep below, which they’d been awaiting so long.

But Erebor was stuffy with all manner of bats and hopping rodents that could bear the Dragons’ stench while he’d lived. The cleaning crews would stand nobody but a dwarf to move the bodies, and Bilbo’s fellow moppers and dusters would double-take at her when she arrived. No hobbits traveled so far as the Iron Hills, and none amongst Dáin’s people had taken the East-West Road to the Blue Mountains.

But Bilbo never had to introduce herself, rather, they made a dwarven to-do of bowing and gratefulness she found tiring.

Sweat was on Bilbo’s brow now, as she swept a besom through clattery bones and dust with an angry grunt.

“Confusticate it, I’m sick of these rats!”

“They’re mice,” came Ori’s voice from behind her. Bilbo turned just enough to see him, staying bent with the broom.

“Then they are fat.”

Ori approached with that close-lipped smile on his face. He stopped a proper distance away, casting left and right. The cleaners were far enough from them, he supposed; scrubbing, pushing brooms, chatting.

Ori leaned a fraction closer and dropped his voice. “I think they are cute.”

“You like fat, small things,” Bilbo shrugged as she turned back to sweeping. Ori came ‘round to her front, smile growing to a crooked grin and mischief in his eye. Still, he stayed an appropriate distance.

“Then shall I call you my mouse?”

“Shhh!” Bilbo tried not to laugh, swatting his shoulder. They checked, but the others working in the wide Hall hadn’t given them much notice or care. Torches and dusty chandeliers glowed steadily all around them.

“If you tarnish my reputation...” Bilbo wagged a finger in a low voice. Ori upped his chin.

“Never, Ms. Baggins.”

“I’d take you with me,” Bilbo reminded him mildly, broom making scratchy sounds on the floor.

Ori picked at the hem of his sleeve. “Could I, um, invite you to supper with me tonight?”

Bilbo paused and cocked her head. “Just us two?”

“Yes,” Ori‘s eyes were on her, but he still picked at his sleeve. Then, as if he’d been dodging shrewd eyes a long time, he added, “I’d tell Nori who’d tell Dori we’re working on my book, with Bísi the cartographer.”

“We have a Bísi the cartographer?”

“No, I made it up just now.”

Bilbo was impressed.

That evening, she changed into a dress for the first time in a long while. It was a dwarven, dusky thing; somber and modest. She groomed the curly mop on her head and then on her feet, humming, and when she locked her door she carried a small barrel under an arm.

Within the hour, Bilbo and Ori were sniggering in a blue haze of smoke.

Dinner was sizzling on an old stove. The pair sprawled the floor in Ori’s small, cozy flat, playing a flute. They took turns making sweet melodies (Ori), and giggling and hooting with it (Bilbo), as the other puffed the fine old pipe they shared.

“This was my father’s pipe, you know,” Bilbo murmured. She blew a smoke ring and Ori watched it from lying on his back.

“What was he like?”

“A Baggins.”

“I have no idea what that means.” Ori accepted the pipe she passed.

“Rather like Dori, really,” Bilbo offered. Ori grunted understanding as he drew on the pipe stem.

The dwarf blew a column of smoke. “Was he that hobbit on your wall?”

“He was,” Bilbo folded her hands under her chin, quietly surprised Ori had remembered. “And my mother beside him.”

“You look more like him than like her.”

“I wonder sometimes,” Bilbo confessed, “If Gandalf wasn’t a mite disappointed.”

Ori tapped out the pipe and refilled it. He passed it to the hobbit, and got up to tend the hare on his stove. Bilbo smelled mushrooms, and smiled privately, knowing Ori had included them for her sake.

The hobbit sighed. “I am so close to convincing Thorin to fashion a mushroom garden, down the South Wing.”

“Are you that good at smelling, you know what this is?” Ori was surprised, but then— no, he wasn’t. “That settles it. Bilbo, you are a mouse.”

“Can you not sniff it?” Bilbo sat up with interest, smoke coiling lazily from the pipe in her hand.

Ori poured them each a mug of wine— a mug, what Father would have thought! “Not vegetables that far away,” he said.

“Mushrooms aren’t vegetables, though,” Bilbo pointed out. Ori made a show of being bored to sleep by this. He brought the mug up for a drink, grousing ‘holy Mahal’ into it as he prodded their meal.

Bilbo laughed easier that supper than she had in months.


	3. Three

Bilbo’s tongue ground in Ori’s mouth, fingers in his hair and ass on his table. The dwarf stood whilst her legs ensnared his rubbing hips, dress bunched up her fat thighs, her smallclothes pushing against him. Ori grabbed her breasts hungrily, he kissed them all their ways; squeezed and handled her. Bilbo pushed forward and sighed.

“May I, Bilbo?”

“Yes,” she whispered eagerly, “yes.”

Ori eagerly popped her buttons. He drew the collar apart; down her gasping breasts, where his eyes caught; before reverently wriggling her cute nipples free. So inviting, Ori’s throat went dry. A thick swallow bobbed the apple in his neck.

Ori may have been 99, but he felt 40, discovering what his own dick was for again. What magic, making Bilbo moan; groaning against her willing flesh. Closing his hot mouth over one hard nipple and greedily fingering the other, because Ori just couldn’t choose.

The table thumped the wall once. Twice. A small bud vase toppled with a ‘cla-clink!’

“Oh, _Ori_.”

He licked her breast shamelessly. They pressed hard and moved fast, both grunting and huffing. Bilbo's mouth fell open as they jostled about, knocking her curls awry.

“Ori!”

Ori stopped locked in place, disheveled; breathing hard. He looked her right in the face, eyes soft. “Can I take you to my bed, Bilbo?”

“Already?” It was high with surprise as Bilbo straightened up, breathlessly pushing at her hair. Perhaps he’s down to business, she thought, recovering breath. Ori’s brow flickered together but he nodded once.

“Isn’t that what we’re doing?” he asked, honestly.

Bilbo opened her mouth to speak but it caught at the end, and she gave a soft, toothy smile to him. “Have you done this before?”

“Dwarves, we don’t— do this as much,” Ori attempted thickly. Had he embarrassed himself? Wait. Who had Bilbo—

Bilbo quite literally pet Ori’s small beard, pressing her topless body against him with small kisses on his mouth. He kept his eyes open and furrowed at her, but accepted them calmly. Quiet mirth lit her watching him.

“My darling, I’m not a Dam. We’re different,” she said quietly. “I’m different.”

“I know.”

“Are you cross?”

There was only the smallest of pauses, wherein Ori sought a real answer.

“No,” he said at length. “You’re mine now.”

Bilbo could have made a fuss about the words, but when you loved a Dwarf, was it really worth it to confuse and upset them so? A patient, genuine smirk curled up her lips. Oh, well. She understood his meaning, and his love.

“Yes.” The hobbit watched Ori’s eyes darken with lust; she felt how his heart sped in the beat of his arm. She smoothed her touch up his bicep and to the circular braid at the back of his head, and Ori’s breath caught oh-so gently as she began to unweave it.

“Bilbo...”

“Mmmmmm?”

“My mouse,” he cooed, kissing her in Dwarf-fashion.

“Yes.”

“My lady.”

“Yes. ...Oh, I am so terribly sad, Ori,” she told him softly, carefully fanning his hair free. Bilbo’s nails lifted goosebumps on his flesh. “And you make me forget all those dreadful things. Yes, you are finer a dwarf than anyone I’ve ever met.”

“You could have a King, you know,” Ori muttered, vulnerable at last. At last.

“I don’t want one,” Bilbo said. “Only a writer, and I want him now. Tonight.”

They fell into Ori’s bed, moaning with her tongue in his mouth. Groping, pushing, squishing. His massive fingers pushed aside a small cotton panty and he felt _everything_ ; a blunt fingertip breached into Bilbo’s impossibly hot, wet body; sinking Ori’s knuckles, her squeezing on it and gasping and egging him on when he moved it.

Bilbo's hands were dry skin on Ori’s prick, dragging heated flesh and pulling him into her mouth. He lost his fucking mind there, head dropping back on pillows and crying out helplessly. It twitched and drooled in her working mouth and he was mortified; tried apologizing for his rudeness. But she only suckled on him, and made it even better.

Ori learned fast; he rolled them over and kissed the lips between her legs, just as she’d shown him to kiss her mouth. Maybe he was a little to the point, but she liked his tongue in her at least as much as the finger. And that was good, Ori thought. Very good, indeed.

The hobbit made his heart leap to his throat when she drew them flush, her wet lips open and sliding on his prick and let Ori have a merry old time humping her noisily into the straw. Her hairy toes curled over his back as Bilbo grunted. Ori grinned with teeth. He sweat, and smelled their musky sex; Ori sucked Bilbo’s nipples like she’d feed him and licked them with greed. Bilbo peaked, gutturally shrieking, into Ori’s pillows. He wanted to crawl inside her and make them both sound like barn animals.

So he did.


	4. Four

On that good, good morning, Ori rolled over to Bilbo. Her back to his headboard, she was nude as Mahal intended, turning an assurance cap over in her hands.

“No pessary,” she marveled again. “Who back home would believe such a thing... The dwarf-secret to small families was bladder.”

“What did you expect?” Ori raised himself up on an arm, amused.

“Oh, well,” Bilbo confessed, “I thought perhaps dwarves weren’t as— potent, if you’ll pardon me.”

Ori made a face.

The hobbit brought the limp sheath to her lips and blew it up at him.

Perhaps Bilbo should have been leaving; this was hardly proper, it must have been seven and people would surely be about the Mountain. But they tangled again, instead, cooing and murmuring under rustling blankets.

Bilbo made faces Ori devoured. Her curls fell in her face and he smoothed them back. His cock stroked deep, and thick into his squeaking hobbit; Bilbo’s nails bit the muscle of his ass as he gave those eager thrusts into tight— searing— slippery. What was there to know?

Ori sat, and she crawled onto his lap, like a dauntless little tree-frog. Bilbo purred _plow me again, Ori_ and he groaned aloud, bent down and licked the tendon of her throat. Bilbo bared it with a lecherous smile as he groped her squishy breasts; kneaded her nipples. Half her excitement from his inexperienced fingers on her was probably the sheer size of them, but oh, the slick running down Ori’s prick was to die for.

Bilbo laced her fingers behind his neck, pulled them down, and Ori fucked and fucked her some more as Bilbo feverishly whispered base things that would never leave the two of them.

He grunted, and started throbbing wetly into her, hissing _yessss._ And Bilbo showed him to keep moving, keep luxuriating inside her, even as his cock emptied and she milked it out of him. She was a fucking brilliant, brilliant woman. He kissed her in both their fashions, to let her know.

In little time Ori dropped asleep, snoring hard.

Bilbo admired him privately as she stood buttoning her dress. The little quirk in her lips dropped off as she fastened at her neck.

She’d hadn’t brought her ring.

Oh, bother.

There was little for it but to peek out the peep-hole in Ori’s door. What a dwarvish thing, she’d scoffed, spying who was on the step before letting them in. Now Bilbo knew it was brilliant.

What she hadn’t counted on was the King Under the Mountain on his way, this good, good morning, to visit Dwalin in the very same apartment-block.

Bilbo was skittering the corner and nearly collided into a wall of dwarf. Thorin harrumphed, as if his startle was inconvenient.

“Burglar.”

“Good morning!” Bilbo gasped, painfully aware her state was both unknown and unkempt. Blast Ori and his lack of looking-glass!

“An early hour for you,” Thorin grunted. Bilbo gave him an unamused look tucking hair behind her ear.

“Yes, well,” she said, “A bit of a walk before first breakfast does one good.”

“Hrmph, and no meal yet anyway. The kitchens will do, tell them I said as much.”

“I’ll do for myself, thank you, Thorin.” Bilbo skirted around him, as Thorin stood unmoving besides his regal head. “Good morning!”

The King did not ‘good morning’, but he watched the hobbit flee with her bare feet slapping the stone floor.

“Wasn’t me,” Dwalin grunted in his home.

“Mind your tongue!” Thorin downed his last tea dregs at Dwalin’s table. He thrust his cup for more, and Dwalin grasped the pot by its body in one meaty fist.

“Maybe she was just walking.” Dwalin poured with care. Thorin watched chestnut-colored tea flow from its spout with his usual frown.

“She walks the east pavilion, overlooking the distant Iron Hills. Unless the wind bites.”

Dwalin stopped pouring but stayed in place, flicking his eyes to Thorin’s face. Thorin met them with tiredness.

“Damn,” the warrior said. Thorin nursed his tea as Dwalin poured more of his own.

“I said... and did... many shameful things to our hobbit in my anger,” Thorin muttered. “My hubris. And now my heart tells me she’s taken a dwarf from my very Halls, as I sit on a throne for which I cast her aside.”

Dwalin watched his King, seeing not the crown and fine clothes so much as his brother-in-arms looking wan.

“You could tell her, you know. Fight for her at least.”

Thorin only shook his head, bowing it. “I’ve no right.”

“Who do you think it is, then?” Dwalin dipped a hard cookie in his tea; something Dori had shown him on the road. Thorin’s brow grew thunderous as he thought not of Bilbo slipping away, but into a waiting pair of arms.

“Some bastard,” Thorin growled lowly, here in the sanctum of Dwalin’s home, where he needn’t be King. “An opportunist without honor, who endangers Miss Baggins’ reputation turning her out at this hour. If I could thrash one more, I would that selfish fool.”

“You don’t know he’s real,” Dwalin said. “You could be jumping the bow.”

“I know it,” Thorin watched his wobbly reflection in his cup for a moment. “I’d know if I wasn’t in this Mountain, I’d feel it.”

“You knew nothing of it until you saw her this morning,” Dwalin eyed him dryly, dunking two cookies at once.

“It confirmed my suspicions.”

“Mm.”


	5. Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to slambam here on Ao3, for helping me so much with this fic and endless support. If you guys like fluffy porn, give their And Then They Did It series a look.

There was was sparse snow falling in tufts and Bilbo was cocooned in fur. Her poor toes were hidden away from the white earth deep in dwarven boots; her feet crunched as she walked an empty field. Nothing like Bilbo's snow-shoes in the Shire, which her dwarves would think no better than slippers, these laced and covered the hobbit's ankle. But, they kept her remarkably dry and warm as she pointed hither and thither.

"We could grow rhubarb here, Bombur. And rye out there."

"And hops!" Bombur agreed. One of Dáin's architects trailed along, rapidly sketching. Bilbo forgot his name. "We must have beer."

Bilbo paused and turned to Bombur, a breeze snagging her curls. "Remind me of what berries the Lakemen grow?"

"Elderberry," Bombur ticked a thick finger, "Wolfberry and chokeberry."

"How dreadful!"

Familiar, heavy footfalls pricked Bilbo's sensitive hobbit ear, and she smiled to herself knowing Ori approached from the North gates. She continued chatting with Bombur, who had knelt in the snow to draw an illustrative line, and feigned polite surprise when he finally pointed out Ori's figure growing on the white.

"Good afternoon, lad," Bombur raised a big, open hand. Ori gave a wave and Bombur pushed himself off his knee.

"Hullo, Master Broadbeam," Ori's eyes peeked above the usual scarf hiding his nose. The weather brought mittens, which he slid into pockets. "Miss Baggins. ...You," he added to the architect. The dwarf frowned disapprovingly and closed his book.

"Good afternoon," he bowed to the three of them. "I will take my leave, it's time for lunch."

"Indeed!" Bombur dusted his hands, and clamped them together. "I'll accompany you on that, sir. Farewell!"

Bilbo and Ori bid them good-bye, and stood together in drifting snow, silently watching their disappearing backs. When Bilbo had decided they had privacy, she turned a knowing eye to Ori. He was already watching her.

"I didn't mean to fall asleep," he said.

"You were tired," she hummed back. The scant bit of his cheek not covered in scarf or hair took a rosy shade.

"Yes, well," Ori drew a small parcel from his pocket, which Bilbo accepted with a surprised few blinks.

"I went to market, it's not from the horde," he was saying as she pulled the waxy twine. "I thought you had enough of that sort already."

Two fine, embellished earrings had Bilbo making a soft face.

"Oh, my word!" she cooed, turning one between her fingers. Light clung to its surface with a slick glisten. "Thank you! Whatever is this for? It isn't your birthday, unless I've entirely forgotten?"

The dwarf's shoulders relaxed. The corners of Ori's eyes crinkled just so, and he admired Bilbo admiring her gift.

"No occasion, besides the night."

Bilbo's smile went coy, and she removed her current earrings one at a time.

"They look different," she observed.

"They're from the Blue Mountains," Ori said. Bilbo had become adept at reading Ori's face from the bit visible between his scarf and bangs. He wore a smirk, pleased with himself or with her; or both. "Erebor's jewelry is quite old-fashioned."

"The Blue Mountains west of the Shire!" Bilbo realized happily, fastening the trinkets into her ears. "Past Rushock Bog."

Ori's eyes pinched with a bigger smile. "I grew up amongst the silver miners in Noglond. Dori thought it was horrid, but I liked it."

"There. What do you think?"

"More beautiful than Princess Royal Dís," Ori answered without hesitating. "And twice as regal."

"Goodness," Bilbo murmured approvingly. "I don't suppose one could give higher praise."

Ori's gaze flicked away only a second as he thought about that. Shavings of snowflakes clung to the yarn of his grey hood; dampened the tawny hair on his forehead. "Only if there was a Queen, yes."

Bilbo's lips carved a wrinkly smile into half her face. How silly. "And would I be more a sight than the Queen?" she teased.

"Of course, my lady. Technically, this is all profanity, but I don't care."

Intrigue swept Bilbo's cat-face away like a besom to dust. Ori rolled his eyes at some dwarven thing she didn't quite see.

"Call me Ori Longbeard, the impious. Nobody is more pretty or has better breasts in all Erebor."

"Well," Bilbo's humor was dry, "Thank you for the endorsement."

Ori gave a face with light in his eyes, mirth under his damn scarf. Bilbo wanted very much to draw it out of her way and reel him down to her height.

"Would you walk with me?" she sidled up to the towering fellow. Ori wordlessly offered his arm as she snaked hers into its bend.

Bilbo rested her cheek on Ori's sweater, and they strolled in-step through a big, empty world. Their breaths puffed small clouds of steam; the only sound besides two noisy sets of boots. Blanketed grassland slipped away, and they slunk into an old treeline still singed black and dead in places, under decades of green regrowth and the new, powdery white.

Hidden away, safe and quiet, Bilbo drew Ori into her space and sidled her back to a rough tree. Their kiss only just met before Bilbo opened her lips to his brazen tongue. Her new lover embraced her and warmed her; made love to her mouth without a word, for a long time. Long enough it soothed Bilbo's frayed nerves like citrus tea to a sick throat.

They stayed together, talking in low tones. Bilbo's fingertips brushed delicately on Ori's cheeks and beard, his scarf simply drawn down over his whiskers. They spoke about the comings and goings of their lives; about Ori's impending end to his apprenticeship to Balin, and Bilbo's crumpled attempts to write her cousins and tell them what had happened to her. She told him she would be baking that afternoon, and asked what he wanted. Ori inhaled deeper, beard bristling excitedly.

"Could you make squab pie?" he used actual, Shire-level manners. Bilbo should appreciate Dori more for having raised him, she realized distantly.

"I'll do my best."

"Oh, my tiny mouse!" Ori's smile was so radiant, it should by rights have melted the snow on them both. "You treat me quite alright."


	6. Six

Thorin was King, and he didn't have time to cook for even one lonely old dwarf. So his Royal Kitchens cooked for him, and for his Company and the two wives between them, and Bombur's audacious brood of 14 dwarflings, and Glóin's unkempt boy. It was a daily, massive, messy affair in a massive, messy dining hall kept for just this purpose. Breakfast was served 6 to 8, lunch noon to 2, and dinner 6 to 8 again. Bilbo, Nori, and Balin could be counted on to miss breakfast; lunch was a loose, undulating mass of arrivals and departures; and dinner always ran late. Thorin would wave off his serving staff, and they'd drink and dessert and play music late into the nights. Times were fittingly good, considering what they had to do to get here.

In fact, Thorin had begun to dare considering their routine rather peaceful. When he put his boots up, it was his own fireplace; his grandfather's fireplace; not a rest on endless road, but home. And home for his people, whom Thorin carried under his long beard and under his breast, long worrying for the uncertain future he could leave them. With their people safely tucked in Erebor for the night, Thorin's forefathers rested in peace; and in this dining hall with his friends, so could he.

Until he saw the earrings.

Thorin hadn't given it a thought, at first. The Hall was full and his Company was settling in, loudly; typical of any other night. Hearty, hot food was being brought to the table and unveiled by Thorin's small staff. Bilbo stood bathed in cozy light from chandeliers, unpacking a basket of golden pies. A musician strummed a harp by the fire. Bombur's redheaded dwarflings scampered behind the hobbit and she was, simply, a picture of peace.

They swung out from her curly hair like fishing lures, ensnaring Thorin's eyes from his seat up the table. He had thought them innocent; he'd assumed Bilbo wore something special for her 'Highday' again. But in hindsight perhaps he was just simple.

Glóin's wife, Liv, came towering at Bilbo's side. "Bilbo! Those are luminous!" she praised. Bilbo did an odd, hobbity gesture by not only tucking her hair back, but leaning much closer to her, inviting Liv to touch both them and herself. Bless her, Liv did just that.

"These aren't from Erebor," Liv mused. "This looks Eriadorian."

"You're quite right."

"There's still fine silver by the sea," nodded Bombur's wife, Rán. She sat nursing their youngest, a leg resting across her knee. "Which trader sold such a pretty thing?"

"Well, I'm afraid I don't know," Bilbo answered shyly. "They were a gift, but the sender is my own secret."

At that, the Dams were all the more delighted. Thorin subtly beckoned to a servant amongst the others' overlapping conversations and clattering plates. The servant came, and bowed to give his ear, and Thorin muttered for brandy. The good brandy.

The King didn't miss the looks his companions shot him as they slurped their soup. Thorin ignored them, and slowly drank his fruity liquor. After his... display with the mithril shirt and his behavior after exiling Bilbo, knowledge amongst them of Thorin's situation was rather plain.

Except, it would seem, to Miss Baggins.

It wasn't easy, being around the people who saw your meltdown. It was less easy being around your sister-sons who saw your meltdown, because amidst the dinner chaos, bar none they were munching the most wide-eyed at him right now. Balin quietly urged him to eat.

"You'll feel better," the old dwarf tapped a sideways fist on Thorin's arm. "Have the squab, it's delectable. It'll take your mind off of anything."

Thorin spared Balin a smirk. He thrust a knife into the closest pie, and scooped a generous slice onto his plate. Thorin still had no appetite, but would eat if it quieted him.

Apparently satisfied, Balin turned his attention down the table. He wore finer clothes now, and his beard had a few new beads; but when he heaved a big sigh, the grin was the same.

"My apprentice," he spoke with a drop of bittersweetness. Ori looked up with a split-second of surprise on his face, then a smile with closed lips.

"Yes, I suppose all that's left is to inform the craft guild back in the Blue Mountains." Balin poured himself a little red wine, feeling sentimental. "I quite consider your renditions of our journey a final portfolio."

Ori stood from his seat and bowed properly. Bilbo watched it all in the corner of her eye from several chairs down, as the occasional food item crossed the air between them. Balin tipped Ori his glass, eyes wrinkled and warm. "Our own Journeyman artist. To think that boy I knew will be free to take a wife!"

"You're telling me," Dori grumbled, putting his elbow on the table, and squishing a cheek on his fist as Ori sat again. "It's still early for that, isn't it?"

Ori shrugged and drew his chair in. Folding his arms on the table, he added like it mattered, "I'll be 100 next autumn."

"Oh, you have 30 years before folks start worrying about settling down," Dori waved at it casually. "There's no rush."

Nori didn't add anything, but Ori felt the eyes coming from his immediate left.

Thorin ordered a second brandy.

For her part, Bilbo was engaged this evening with the Dams and Rán's four daughters. Bilbo had never considered herself much of the mothering type, but she only had about half a choice, because the girls flocked to her. Little Gad showed off her missing teeth, and Bilbo asked if Goblins had taken them.

Ori stole glances her way, when everybody's ruckus hid him in plain sight. Ori was clever and quick as a harmless little garden snake, and neither Bilbo nor Thorin nor Dori would catch him.

And oh, how he knew Thorin could.

Even after that damned mithril fiasco... Friendship, kinship, and loyalty to his Mahal-appointed sovereign all made rubbing Thorin's nose in this unappealing. They never intended to fall in love with the same hobbit-woman. Things happen when you hike together for a year.

Ori pondered these things and tore his bread, and mopped up the dregs of his soup.

That night, Ori came calling late. 11 o'clock on the nose, in fact; Bilbo's clock chimed the hour as she opened her door. The light in the alley was brighter than inside her house, stretching her shadow and Ori's across her floor.

"I couldn't get away," Ori was saying as he slipped inside. Bilbo locked the door, and watched the looming dwarf draw off his face-scarf by the shoe rack.

"From Dori?"

"Yes," he half-whispered, tossing the scarf on a peg. "He wanted to chat all night, I had to get him drunk enough to _go_ to _bed."_

Bilbo smiled sweetly, but it quickly went shy. Ori peeled off his boots one at a time, and they landed noisily and flopped over. He turned in time to watch Bilbo's nightgown puddle to the floor.


	7. Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i do all the fucking work in this house

Ori came and scooped Bilbo bridal-style into his arms, as if she weighed a scoop of flour. The hobbit chuckled, but draped her head on Ori's shoulder, stroking his beard with amusement curving her mouth.

"You liked my little show at dinner, hmm?" Ms. Baggins' eyes were clever and dangerously brown, flicking up to Ori's face. He got a crooked grin and began walking, still in his socks.

"What should I say? You bring out the Dwarf in me. Bed? Bath?"

"Bed!" Bilbo said, so Ori carried her that way. "If you want to see me in the bath, you'll have to do much better than 11."

'Bed' wasn't a grand affair, but it wasn't that bad. Until the Mountain was more settled they still had to use wool and hay on these antique bedframes, but it was of wholesome quality. Bilbo blew out the hanging lamp as they passed into her room. She was burning incense in here, which was expensive, but money didn't mean anything anymore. And pleasantly, it got rid of that eggy Dragon odor without opening her deep-set windows to falling snow.

A messy self-portrait Bilbo had long ago asked of him sat on her vanity now. Ori's heart physically lurched from joy, but he said nothing of it.

Ori released her and stripped his clothes, starting with a tunic over his head. The hobbit watched from reclining on the bed, eyes roaming his chest and then his prick, which stirred and stiffened under just her attention.

He sat on the hay and Bilbo moved atop his thighs, arching her chest hopefully. The dwarf dragged his tongue on one hard nipple as he massaged her breasts, flesh pillowing between Ori's knuckles with ink stains on his middle finger. Bilbo laid on her back and said his name in a hoarse, quiet voice, and Ori tongued her sex; licking the bead at the top down to the intimate hole her body opened for a friendly cock. With her fingers buried in Ori's hair he brought her high and needy until everything popped, and bliss engulfed Bilbo and she was gone. On this orgasm she gave him husky, rhythmic groans from deep in her chest.

Bilbo was boneless and warm and fuckable and he climbed atop her. From her nest of pillows and curls, she cooed 'this is quite good', so he had to kiss her.

Ori sat on his knees only briefly and tested the assurance cap for holes, blowing into it. He glanced to Bilbo as he did so. She wore an expectant little smirk. So with no choice at all, really, Ori determinedly mounted her. Pushing into Bilbo made her stretch and mewl on his cock, and Ori grinned with his teeth, and he watched her pleasured face and closed eyes. His strange, perfect, tiny mouse.

And she preened under Ori's vulgar compliments until he was done.

They sat nestled together afterwards, watching dark snow flurries pass Bilbo's window. Ori was straight and tall and calm, legs comfortably folded. A pipe glowed orange in his hand. Bilbo had curled herself contentedly into Ori's side, drawing her own pipeweed through a long stem.

There were only few words, spoken in voices soft and low.

Smoke and incense slunk through the air, serpentine, coiling, and aimless. Bilbo laid on her side with a quiet rustle of hay and stayed there. She smiled her closed lips at him in a way that squinted sweet eyes on a heart-shaped face.

She looked precious and divine, Ori thought, but tired in a way that couldn't be fixed with sleep. The firmly Dwarf part in himself wished he could squirrel Bilbo away from the violent world that did her wrong. The Mountain was close enough to that, he supposed.

Ori carefully crawled close, more on his belly really, and gently brought his brow to hers as his eyes slid closed. She held him in her arms, and kissed his mouth and face, slowly in the silent gloom, until he was heavy and hard again. Bilbo rolled over, and Ori somewhat wide-eyed, took the invitation.

He was soon kissing his lips on her back and shoulders. His shaky breaths on her neck puffed harder as she sank slick and tight over his swollen prick. Ori screwed his eyes shut and pressed his teeth on her shoulder, grunting, once. Bilbo bit her bottom lip, and got a smug sort of grin on elbows and knees, until his cock just kept on filling her. Her jaw dropped and Bilbo's top half melted against the bed. Ori was, shall we say overcome, and he hadn't jostled her about this much before but Bilbo _loved_ it, crying out loud without a drop of shame in the world.

"Ori! Ori, please!"

__

_"Yes!"_

__

"The bead--!" she twisted sheets in an iron grip.

__

"Yes! ...Oh! Let me--"

__

"Stars!" Bilbo gasped. "Oh, _stars. Ori."_ It was so smoky-sweet, Ori's eyes rolled closed and he grimaced, fingers tightening on her hip.

__

"You can't talk to me like that," he warned.

__

"Ori," Bilbo breathed again, turning to see him in the dark. Ori kissed the side of her head because the angle was bad for such things. He tucked his face into Bilbo's warm hair and hummed, pulsing wet and hot and relieved deep in her body. Bilbo sighed slowly, and relaxed, and went pliant.

__

She slept heavily that night, Ori snoring beside her. As stories were spreading of their daring heroics that very minute, they were two lumps under blankets they had been given some three months prior, on their way to surely die. The same sort Ori had drawn about his shoulders and sat alone, and prayed Bilbo would come back out a secret door. Now snow buried their tired old Mountain, and the tired town of Esgaroth over its choppy, dark water. Ori drew her close in his sleep.

__

Alone in his bed, Thorin lay awake.

__

He laid on his back with thick fingers laced atop his sternum. His breaths rocked them up and down as he watched the ceiling.

__

_"The sender is my own secret."_

__

The King rubbed his tired eyes for the umpteenth time. He tried not to dwell on how silly he must have looked to his fellows, pursuing a woman half his age. But Bilbo hadn't understood him, and he hadn't her; she'd worn the very mithril and helm declaring his love when she burgled the Treasure of his father's house, and sold it. And she'd worn them on the ramparts that terrible morning, when Thorin-- he shook his head, closing his eyes with a hot wave of shame. His actions that day weighed the heaviest on him of 200 years of regrets.

__

Even thinking of Frerin was easier than this.

__


	8. Eight

_To Cousin Dora,_

_Oh my dear Doe, I'm sorry I quite vanished. I didn't know anything of leaving until I had already left. I can only apologize for any worry I've caused._

_I joined a party of 13 Dwarves and have moved to the northern Wilderlands with them (really), and I do think I shall be a long time before seeing your dear face again._

_Could you please send back a portrait of yourself? And the portraits of Mother and Father too? I have attached money for a good, dependable artist. NOT our cousin! Please keep the extra without fretting, I have come into a good deal of fortune and will be sending more._

_I will tell you the story soon, but for now I tire quickly, and the story is too long. Know I am indeed safe and miss you dreadfully. Hugs and kisses to you and your brothers._

_P.S., Could you read the enclosed to my gardener, Mr. Gamgee?_

_Hamfast,_

_I humbly apologize for my rude and sudden disappearance. I unexpectedly found myself going East, but I am well, and hope the same for you and your family._

_Please accept this recompense for work I've no doubt you've upkept, as Bag End's garden is at least as much your pride as it's mine. You'll find I'm raising our rate as well. Included is forward payments through Forelithe, and my deepest gratitude. There isn't anybody I trust with my mother's penstemons but the hands of a Gamgee. Warmest thanks._

"Writing?" Ori touched Bilbo's back, approaching her desk with a mug of tea. Bilbo had been scratching a quill with her forehead in her hand, and looked up to him as snow kept on outside the window.

"I finally managed, in a fashion... I want to send my gardener Hamfast more money as a gift, but Ham would sooner lay down and die."

"Sounds dwarvish." Ori hummed, and sipped his tea. "...'Ham'?"

"He's too young for me."

Bilbo was nude in a robe; it was still cool despite the crackling fireplace. Ori had started dressing but hadn't quite made it to a shirt on this lazy morning. The puncture wounds from giant spider bites had left nasty scars on his abdomen, and these Bilbo touched gently.

"What did it feel like getting poisoned?" Her eyes lifted to his face but her fingertips stayed. Ori made an eyebrow-move over his mug: 'I'm swallowing, one moment.'

"Bad," Ori croaked after drinking. He cleared his throat. "But when I couldn't move or shout was much worse."

"I can only imagine," Bilbo muttered. She drew her touch from his skin and Ori bent at the waist, recieving a soft smooch on his mouth. When they parted, Bilbo felt Ori's face like testing the fluffiness of a sheep.

"Why does your folk keep such splendid beards?" she asked then. Bilbo glanced up with a half-apologetic little smirk, expecting the polite, embarrassed decline she'd run into on their first month out of the Shire. But instead Ori opened his mouth to speak, lost half a second, but pushed on.

"...Because Mahal made his first dwarves with beards," he said. "And probably has one Himself."

"Who is Mahal?" Bilbo pressed excitedly. "I've heard that name many times this year, but none of you would tell me a thing!"

"We're secretive," Ori sighed. He drew a nearby treasure chest closer and simply sat on that. "Mahal means 'The Maker', since he shaped the Seven Dwarf Fathers. The first of us."

"How could somebody make seven dwarves," Bilbo asked coyly, as if Ori was pulling her leg. "Mahal was a Dwarf too, wasn't he?"

"No," Ori said, much to her surprise. He folded an arm on her desk and got comfortable, tea in hand. "Mahal made the world, He's older than everything."

"Is he a person? I'd thought all this time he was real."

"He is real," Ori answered mildly. "But He's also not a person. We can't go to Him, He has no body."

Bilbo frowned, furrowing her brow thoughtfully. "Then how do you know him?"

_"I_ don't, personally," Ori pressed his chest. "But all dwarves know of Him, and He knows every dwarf."

"What does he think of you?"

"That's a good question," a good-natured laugh crept in Ori's voice. There came a sudden, sharp wrap at the door, turning both their heads.

Bilbo got to her furry feet tightening the robe about herself.

"Who the blazes at this hour?" she complained under her breath. Ori's whiskers bristled with alarm.

"You aren't going to open it, are you?" he murmured.

"I wasn't going to invite them _in,"_ she whispered back. "What if it's urgent?"

"What could be urgent anymore?" Ori watched her putter about, wrapping more layers about herself. "Everybody's dead or too tired to do anything."

"Stand over there, in the kitchen where they can't see."

Ori made sure to grumble this was a bad idea as he did what she said.

At the door was a Dwarf in blues and silvers she'd come to know as Thorin's house. He bowed politely, and Bilbo did too, holding her robe snug at the collar.

"Good morning, Miss Baggins," Ori heard from the kitchen. He opened the tea jar, frowning; missing coffee they couldn't get yet.

"Good morning, well met," Bilbo's little voice answered.

"I've come to deliver a private message." Ori's ear pricked as he scooped leaves. "Are we quite alone?" He leaned closer.

"Yes, quite."

"Her Royal Highness, Princess Royal Dís, arrived quietly last night. She wishes to remain inconspicuous for a day of rest, but invites you to dine with her and her family this morning."

Ori's eyes went wide and he blinked owlishly as the reality set in. Bilbo and the messenger spoke a bit more and parted ways, but by the time she'd rounded the wall to the kitchen he must not have mastered his face.

"What's wrong, my worried old dwarf?"

Ori swallowed quickly. Damnit. "Nothing's wrong, but I am worried about this stuffy breakfast with Kings."

"Thorin's only one stuffy king," Bilbo teased.

"Daín could well be there, he is their cousin. And Dís' husband Prince Víli."

The amusement drained from Bilbo's face.

"It is a stuffy breakfast with Kings," she muttered.


	9. Nine

Ori helped Bilbo ready, while she complained she hadn't a clue what was appropriate. The hobbit paired her Blue Mountains earrings to pearls on a chain from the far-away Sea; rummaged from irreplaceable treasures heaped like laundry in a chest. Being sized for a grown Dwarf, it hung too low for Bilbo's liking. Ori twisted it in a loop over her head, so the string hung in two tiers at a proper height.

"A lover and a thinker, how lucky I am," Bilbo hummed, making Ori blush bright red.

Her dwarf had something on his mind and his tongue; Bilbo could tell donning her coat. She cupped his furry cheek with a fond gaze, and broke his willpower.

"Think of me while you're with the King?" Ori brought her hand to his heart, cupping it in his own massive one.

"How could I not? I'm sure I'll think of little else," she flirted. Ori grew a little smile.

Bilbo had been in Thorin's subterranean palace a few times, but honestly needn't come over for much. Things had never quite recovered between them, she thought sadly, as a doorman lead her through a long lit hall. To her left lined windows into a raw and surely sacred cave, pregnant with giant and ancient gems, glowing on their own in the dark.

Much as a gazebo was kept in a garden, the structure Bilbo was brought to stood in a glistening cavern. Crystal viens thick as trees crawled up the walls like viens in a living heart, twinkling in plentiful lantern-light.

The Royals sat around a long table, chatting with a small echo. A celloist played something slow and dwarfy, admittedly pretty, but it haunted the cavern. The doorman bowed low and backed away from Bilbo at a respectful distance.

A Dam looked to her, and Bilbo would know her to be Dís anywhere. The hobbit bent at her waist in her best, deepest and straightest, dwarfiest dwarf bow. Dís smiled and got to her feet, and dipped forward herself.

"Do I have the pleasure of addressing Miss Baggins?" she asked, as King Daín rose and, quite shockingly, dipped as well. Fíli, Kíli and Thorin followed suit, Kíli looking confused. The only Dwarf left, who must have been Prince Víli, nodded to her from staying seated.

"It's more than any Baggins deserves, Ma'am." Bilbo only rose after the last Royal. As they seated themselves, Dís gestured to an empty seat between her and Thorin.

"Please join us," Dís' accent wasn't as thick as Thorin's, Bilbo noticed, "We've brought preserves all the way with us. They were bought by traders in The Shire."

Bilbo's heart leapt, and then it twinged, and she schooled herself as she approached the table. She nodded respectfully again to Daín and Víli as she drew in an oversized chair.

"Thank you, Your Highness," she told Dís. Thorin was stiff and quiet on Bilbo's other side, and she caught his eye before they both looked away. She busied herself with napkins, he with eggs.

"Good morning."

"Good morning, Thorin."

"My brother has told me how it's thanks to you," Dís said, "We not only have our home back; more important than this to me, you saved the lives of my sons three times over. I thank you for that."

Bilbo could only nod her head, getting pinked. Dís was a singularly beautiful Dam, it was true, kind in the eyes and regal in the face.

"It was an honor, Ma'am."

"It's our honor," Víli spoke unexpectedly. "You're quite a hero, Miss Baggins."

"T'orín has told us some of your people," Daín spoke with a heavy dwarf-tongue, indeed. "And we have 'oped ít would please you best to do ít here, not ín ceremony."

"Whatever do you mean, sir King?" Bilbo felt squeaky and tiny as the mouse Ori called her. Dís gracefully selected a rather large, flat leather box from beside her plate, and opened it for Bilbo. Inside on a velvet bed was a shining gold medal, shaped in an intricate and jewel-encrusted axe, so polished Bilbo could see her face.

"The runes read, _'Baruk Sigin-tarâg',"_ Dís' khuzdul rolled rich off her tongue. "It is our Durin's Axe, the highest honor we can give. Take this, but it is small to what you have done for me."

Thorin watched Bilbo cover her mouth in surprise from the corner of his eye. Tenderness plucked his heartstrings, and he allowed himself to be pleased he could do this much for her. An intimate occasion, and food from home... and maybe, a new woman-friend for mysterious woman-things. He'd done well. Thorin nodded and harrumphed and ate through the ensuing conversation, but most of it was Bilbo answering his family's fascinated questions about things Thorin already knew.

"Thorin told us you were small, but I can hardly believe my spectacles, madam. How did you kill so many giant spiders?" Víli asked, gruff shyness gradually blooming away with curiosity. Thorin knew this about him from holidays and drinking.

Bilbo made a bit of a face. "It is distasteful breakfast conversation, I'm afraid."

Daín chuckled, and it was a chortling, wheezing sort of laugh one would expect of an old wolf.

"Not ín t'ís famíly."

Bilbo got a hesitant, crooked twitch of the lips. "Very well. I went for their eyes."

The Longbeards and Daín muttered approvingly.

"Bilbo, those earrings are quite handsome. I am curious of something. May I see?" Dís held out a hand, and Bilbo unhooked one from herself and placed it with care. Dís turned it over between remarkably unscathed dwarven fingers.

"Víli, I believe these are yours," the Princess mused. "V.B. is hidden in your usual spot."

"Is it indeed?" Víli moved his chair back, but then something Bilbo had never seen before happened. His chair kept moving; gliding, in fact, as Víli pushed a pair of wheels fastened right to it. Víli passed behind his sons and 'round the table, where Bilbo saw his legs ended at the knee.

The Prince accepted Bilbo's earring from his wife and when he smirked, it looked like Kíli.

"So it is. I made these working as a jeweler in Thorin's Halls."

"Did you really!" Bilbo cried with delight. Thorin's good mood drained as quick as it came. That had been nice. Víli and Bilbo spoke of how he had met his wife through his profession, as Bilbo praised _'How romantic.'_ She fastened the earring back to herself and beside her, Thorin got a good look at it for the first time.

Finely made, and his dwarf-sense told him quite valuable. Thorin could have given better. But at least the fool slinking around, taking the love of Thorin's life to bed had done something properly.

"The Broadbeams are amongst the eldest three Houses," Víli was telling Bilbo proudly. "Not all are so lucky to have their First Father's Hall. But we've always worked the Blue Mountains' silver."

Thorin's stomach dropped, and jealous anger boiled hot and fast into his chest, so much he clenched his teeth in his mouth and red crept up his neck. All at once he _knew_. He knew! He should have known all along!

It was that flirting, drunken, braying ass of a silver miner... Bofur Broadbeam.


	10. Ten

The evening lamps lit their old but fair city, dimmer than those before. The smells of cleverly spiced dinners floated from a hundred glowing dwarf-mansions, and a tall fountain of good water babbled in the courtyard beyond. It was this Rán watched in thought, arms folded and leaning on the doorframe.

Bofur sat on his family's porch with six nephews perched on or around him. Rán stood in the door behind, and orange light spilled out with Bifur's crooning clarinet. It would pause, and warbly, less sure clarinets would copy a simple melody; sounds of the children inside, learning from him.

The younger brothers marched wooden Dwarf soldiers up the mountainous terrain of Bofur's legs, or soared birds with a pull-string through the belly to flap their wings. Bofur had been unable to do what he'd wanted for them, back in Noglond. But now, with all the money in the world for treats and sweets, the toys he had carved were still kept like their treasures.

"The Eagles are coming!"

"Ahhhh! Look out!"

"My name is Daín, and you killed my father!" they squealed in Khuzdul. Orange, Firebeard hair like Bofur's late mother topped most of their heads.

"That's a bonny doll," Bofur complimented his youngest nephew, who smiled shyly, showing a few milk-teeth and bald apple-cheeks. "Did your aunt Bilbo get you that?"

A nod, the lad hugging his floppy toy to himself. She smiled at everything and nothing with sweet, black eyes; the darker the prettier, it was usually thought.

"I like Bibo!" he exclaimed.

"Yes, I'd imagine we all like Bilbo," Bofur nodded in approval. The babe thrust his toy out to Bofur, who gently pat her yarn beard. He praised the lad for taking proper care of his favorite thing; a Dwarvish lesson you couldn't start too early.

Rán straightened off the doorway, and gave a polite dip towards the fountain.

"Good evening, King Thorin," she greeted the approaching figure.

"Pray, don't worry about that." Thorin drew down a simple hood and bowed back to the Dam of the house. A luminated lantern swung on his belt.

"You missed breakfast and lunch!" Bofur said. "We've skipped dinner to fend for ourselves. Will you come in?"

Thorin left his hood down, but straightened with a typically grim face.

"No, thank you. In fact I've come to seek audience with you."

"With me?" Bofur sat taller, eyebrows going high. He began peeling off nephews and the gaggle receeded from him. "That sounds fine. I'll be back, then."

Thorin waited, and Bofur followed him away from the house. They walked half in silence down an alley, Thorin essentially wandering until the first stone building they crossed still empty. Bofur's one-way chatter creaked to a stop at its queer arrival. What was Thorin doing?

As all property in Erebor this was Thorin's by right, which was the long way of saying he was letting himself in. Bofur followed suit, eyes round and curious. Corpses had been removed; evident by large patches in the dust. Thorin hung his lantern on the wall, making light and shadows swing wildly around. He pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I'd imagine you know what this is about," the King began growlier than perhaps intended. Bofur stood straight, but glanced at the door.

"...Aye," he agreed cautiously. Jealousy and pure venom churned furiously in Thorin's chest, darkening his look in the lantern light.

"I'll ask one thing," Thorin said in a low voice. "Was this present in the short courtship in which I proposed to Miss Baggins."

Bofur blinked hard, and got a truly bewildered look. "No? I'd say that wouldn't be possible."

Thorin closed his eyes and took a breath.

"Good. Good." Thorin looked away and stroked his beard.

"Thorin--"

"We've no ties of kinship, Master Broadbeam. But I'd never thought you capable of crawling up the skirts of who is plainly dearest to me as I newly grieved."

Bofur exhaled air and took off his hat, combing fingers nervously back through his hair.

"It was some 100 years ago, now," Bofur offered stiffly and awkwardly, making Thorin furrow his brow. "You two were only visiting Noglond, you know, and we were young, and we thought..."

"What the devil are you talking about?" Thorin's patience was fraying fast, and if he hadn't actually experienced it before, he'd say his sanity was surely following. Bofur blinked.

"I'm uh, not talkin' about anything--"

"You..." Thorin's eyes narrowed to slits. "Bedded... My sister?"

"What were _you_ talking about?" Bofur pulled on his hat by the tongues.

"Damn you, Broadbeam! Don't distract me. Who hammered the iron **stones** on you to lay a finger on your unwed princess!"

"Now Thorin--"

"I will never know--" Thorin floundered and snorted and puffed, like an agitated bull, "Of the Line of Durin--"

"She was older than me!" Bofur said. "And a fine lass, Thorin, it wasn't all that."

"I do not wish to know what it was!" Thorin's face had gone hot from his beard to his ears, and furthermore, this wasn't even the Dwarf! Thorin had come expecting the worst and this was worse still!

"If you've spoken a word of her honor in 100 years, I'll have your tongue," Thorin wrenched the lantern off its hook. Bofur was positive he wasn't exaggerating. "This conversation doesn't leave here."

"You'll get no argument from me!" Bofur watched him bemused and relieved. Thorin started to whirl around but stopped, turning sharply back to the miner. He thrust a warning finger at him, and Bofur rose his hands in surrender.

"My sister. Dís."

"Hands off, I know! Maker, Thorin, she's married," he said. Thorin realized just now, after a year, Bofur had a few inches on him and was looking down. "It's not like she's here anyway."

Thorin cussed to himself and turned away.


	11. Eleven

Ori cussed quietly, prodding a snapping fire in Bilbo's fireplace.

Finally, Ms. Baggins' never-ending year was drawing to its close. They all slunk now, in a tired, sore haze, through the last hangers-on of Foreyule. Ori simply called this the 12th month, in the dwarf-fashion; just as he considered the start of the week Highday, whilst Bilbo thought it Sterday; and didn't understand when she called them these things.

However they marked it, over a month had passed since the Battle of Five Armies. But Bilbo preferred not to think of time that way. Her father had always said every morning was a new beginning.

The obvious question now, which nobody felt ready to answer, was, 'What do we do about Yule?'

For the children's sake, Bilbo certainly thought they should do something. The poor things had spent a wretched year wagoning to the Iron Hills, fearful of uncertain futures and dead fathers.

But burrowed in their icy mountain and her whistling winds, a tomb until just that autumn, nobody was much for holiday merriment and gay parties. Erebor herself was soiled, smelled rancid and felt sad. Furthermore, relations with the neighbors were dismal business. Bilbo quite doubted Bard wanted Thorin, Son of Thraín, Son of Thror, King Under the Mountain, to step one ungrateful boot on his dock ever again. And they couldn't very well leave Thorin, so visiting Lake-town and letting them deal with Yule was out.

So plum out of ideas, Bilbo gave up. For now.

"It's getting colder," Ori complained. The poker rolled a log over coals that crunched, baring rippling orange embers in its underbelly. Ori nestled wood on this, heedless of the heat licking his fingers.

Bilbo watched from an antique dwarf-chair. Her hair was shaggy again, like a frizzy nest over the dark blanket she'd wrapped about herself. She wore only her once-white linens all the way from the Shire, and those beloved earrings.

"I feel silly."

"You look a dream," Ori took his seat opposite her, and picked up his sketchbook. He resumed following her nose with charcoal on the page.

"I'll put you in your clothes from the journey, if you like."

"Oh, keep it I suppose," Bilbo shrugged with her small voice. "This can be for only you."

Ori flashed his eyebrows and got more comfortable.

The next time Ori glanced to her, he did so again and stayed there. Bilbo had shrugged the coverings off one shoulder, displaying a ripe hanging breast. Ori dragged his charcoal harder, his eyes locked with her mischievous ones.

It was the middle of the afternoon, but no neighbors would worry Ms. Baggins today. A thrush taking the pause in weather may spot Ori nuzzling her neck and parting her shirt, but up here that was all who could.

She'd turned quite queer and scared of her home's view at first, until two things had happened: one, Balin explained any window would be such a height, and her corner flat had twice the average. These were precious few and important to her.

And two, Bilbo had taken to thinking herself a bird, in a tree so vast nothing could shake her down.

Ori snatched as she playfully stepped away, turning Bilbo so she melted a warm, solid back to his chest. The dwarf felt rather than saw her little body relaxing. Lines from the window roved her sunlit skin, and Bilbo's fingertips brushed his knuckles on her waist. Ori excitedly hauled them both and Bilbo gave a loud, laughing cry as they stumbled to the rug. As Ori climbed atop her his tongue insistently met hers, and it dawned upon Bilbo he came to call for tongue-kisses more and more. Curls splayed on the floor, her lips curled upwards and opened and crushed against his, and Bilbo grunted into his mouth.

She'd half a mind to demand the bed, but more than half to be adventurous and rugged.

Ori rolled his hips forward on instinct alone as she unlaced his breeches. Dust floated in the window's light as Bilbo tugged them low and climbed down Ori's broad body, on her back beneath him. On hand and knee, Ori bit the back of his wrist and closed his eyes as her tongue played with his heavy cock. His eyes fluttered and he let out a whimper when Bilbo drew down the foreskin, and the humming didn't stop. Ori's toes curled in worn old socks as her wet mouth brought licks of heat up his spine and deep in his belly. His knees weakened like their first, clinging kiss.

"Come back up," Ori croaked breathlessly, looking at Bilbo upside-down. "I want to tup you. It's been days."

"Oh, you poor dwarf," Bilbo did push herself towards his face. "You surely wouldn't have survived much longer."

"Not much, no."

Bilbo dwarf-kissed him, gripping Ori firmly by the nape. He mouthed and licked her neck as Bilbo grimaced in pleasure, sensation heightened by his prickling beard. Ori caressed dry, calloused fingertips inside Bilbo's naked thighs-- then grabbed the squishy flesh, moaning around her tongue. They worked into quite a noisy, grunting lather, Ori greedily fucking her with a finger-- could have been two, if he'd been another hobbit, but they still worked together. Bilbo squirmed and sighed sweetly, lips plump from kisses.

"I'm empty, I'm empty," she pleaded all a-tremble, and Ori tongued her pert nipples as she arched. "Fill me up, oh! Have me!"

He untangled from her with muffled, distracted murmurs smushed between her insistent kisses. When they peeled apart Ori hurried away only a moment, and Bilbo flopped back and lay panting between the armchair and messy tea table. She took her deep breaths, naked, and watched illuminated dust move high above her. Bilbo huffed stray hair out of her face.

When Ori knelt down with her again, he unrolled the silly looking assurance cap over his cock, and Bilbo demandingly snared her legs around him without even poking fun at it this time.

Ori skewered her quickly, crowding her back against the rug. He shook Bilbo's cries from her. Ori ground rug-burns into his knees that would smart, but all he knew was Bilbo's raw muscles milking his cock; how there was no coming back from this edge; how his body burned to fill her up, their little secret. 

When Bilbo praised him like this, manners gone; panting about his prick, about how she loved Ori on her and wanted to take all of what he gave; every time Ori felt bigger and happier than he had in his life.

"Finish in me, I want to feel it--"

"I wouldn't cheat you," Ori whispered.

Bilbo keened and grimmaced, face going red and hot. "I want it every day!"

Ori bunted his lips to her ear and ground out, "I'd fill you during our own breakfast." Bilbo's jaw dropped open.

_"Ori."_

"Would you like that?"

"Plow me in the kitchen while I cook," she breathed.

"Durin's _beard!"_

"Would you like that?" she whispered back, getting a grin as Ori humped faster. Skin smacked skin and his thumb stroked the pearl of her sex how he'd learned she liked best.

"Cheeky," he hummed, in love, but said no more. Ori didn't have the wits for it as Bilbo started noisily sighing and cooing, gripping his shoulders and wriggling about. His throbbing and the warmth blooming inside her tipped Bilbo into carnal contractions around his cock, body lighting up entirely, together for the first time. Bilbo got so loud, she slapped a hand over her mouth and moaned into that. Ori kissed the fingers.


End file.
